Minutes to Midnight (24 page)

Raven moved past me and back into the
townhouse. Raven and I stepped inside to see him grab the keys from
the table by the door. The large man gave me a thumbs up and
left.

"He's worried about Mike."

"We all are. Djins are not something you
want overshadowing you. Mike knows how to shield himself, but even
he's going to give out of will if we don't get that thing out of
him." She put a hand on my shoulder. "Go shower. I'll get things
packed. Then you need to eat and sleep. We've been consulting the
BBOE about Djins and Darius has been in the local library for
weeks. I think we might have some ideas we didn't before."

Raven was right. Running off half-baked
wasn't the way to do this. Whatever juice I'd taken from Rhonda was
nearly gone. And a shower sounded very…very nice.

I smelled bacon macaroni. That was Stella's
specialty and something she'd gotten me hooked on when I lived with
her. I ate nearly all of it, downed a full pitcher of tea and then
one of water, plus two apples, a banana, a bowl of cereal, and then
I drank the milk.

Stella's Susie Home Maker
attitude worried me. This wasn't the same Stella I remembered, but
I wasn't sure if this change was because of time in the Peripheral,
or if Rhonda…
Charybdis
…did something to her.

I stood under the shower for
ages, just hoping the heat would wash or burn away the things I'd
seen. I knew Raven wouldn't let what she'd seen in my blood go and
I would have to face her and explain things a bit more. I was
ashamed of what I'd done to Rhonda.
Horrified
didn't come close to
describing it. The thought that I was capable of that kind of
destruction terrified me. Maybe I was afraid it would terrify Raven
too.

Or give Darius a reason to actually shoot
me.

After a four hour nap, Raven woke me. She'd
cleaned and bandaged my thigh while I slept. She also assured me I
wasn't going to be a Lamia. Darius was back, the car gassed. She
and Stella had packed my things. Everyone was at the table when I
ambled down stairs, thinking I could use another shower to wake up
now.

And a cane. I really needed something to
take the edge off my thigh.

After a desert of apple pie and cinnamon ice
cream, Raven filled Darius in on a few things and I told them about
the Ghoul in the cemetery.

Raven said she'd call Mephistopheles and let
him know what happened to Lucy. After knowing this, that Society he
likes might decide to bust in on our rescue." She narrowed her eyes
at me. "What is it? What else haven't you told us?"

I twisted my head to the right to pop my
neck. "What do you know about Charybdis?" I fixed my gaze on
Raven's face. "Her brother Scylla, the Chimera, and Echidna. You
talked about them before."

"Aren't those mythological things?" Daren
said as he finished his fifth slice of pie.

Raven returned the look. "You want to know
more. Does this have something to do with what happened to
you?"

"Yeah it does…but I need to know about her
first. And I'd like to hear it from a Revenant."

"All right." She leaned back in the easy
chair with a drink in her hand. "There once was a very happy
couple, Lilith and Samael. They loved each other beyond measure.
And they believed nothing could ever taint that love. Until they
had a child. They called her Echidna. She was beautiful,
articulate, and very powerful, even at a young age. But she also
enjoyed cruelty and loved to experiment on creatures weaker than
herself. Not long after she reached adulthood, she gave birth to a
set of twins. A boy and a girl named Scylla and Charybdis. No one
knew who the father was, and Echidna didn't care. They were nearly
as beautiful as she was and she doted on them endlessly because
they shared her cruel nature.

"But Echidna's father was unfaithful to her
mother and fell in love with another woman. He left his daughter,
and his grandchildren, to have many, many children with this new
love. Echidna watched her mother's heart break, until eventually
Lilith lost her heart and was tossed from her place of power.
Echidna was furious, and it is rumored this anger gave birth to a
third child. This child she called Chimera."

Raven sipped her drink. "But having this new
child didn't ease her pain, so she had the new wife killed. When
Samael discovered what his daughter had done, he sent every minion
in his World after her. He wanted her head. But she escaped by
fleeing into the Material world. She was the first to consume a
human. To overshadow it. To control it so her father's minions
wouldn't be able to sense her whereabouts."

"You mean…she didn't join with it."

"No. She
commanded
it. Unfortunately, such a
union just burned the poor human up. She had to move from body to
body to stay hidden. Now, during this time, one of her father's new
children, a stupid little girl named Sophia, destroyed her father
and took over his throne. She banished nearly all of her brothers
and sisters from the Dark World and sent her own beasts after
Echidna and her children. Sophia didn't want the murderer of her
mother to die. No, she wanted her to suffer.

"Now, Echidna loved praise. She loved being
adored and worshipped, so she used her powers and developed a small
following after she possessed a young man named Apollodorus. It was
by this fame she was captured and entombed by a spell. Sophia
commanded her sister, Inanna, to write this spell that would bind
and corrupt Echidna. It would make her a monster like the monsters
she had created. Echidna vanished from the world and Sophia cursed
Echidna's followers to forever keep her secret and guard her tomb
so she could never be found."

I glanced over at Stella as she cleared the
dishes.

Darius leaned forward. "Is she still there
in the tomb?"

Raven smiled. "No one knows where the tomb
is, so there is no way to say yes or no." She looked at me. "You
know of the Bulwark."

"I know of it."

"The Bulwark happened when the worlds went
to war. The White Knights of the Angelic horde, as they called
themselves, lead by Scylla and Carybdis, believed the machinations
of the Dark World's children were despicable and all of them should
be put down. They declared the first strike by killing off the God
Mother's children—the keepers of the borders—one by one."

"Sophia retaliated and sent out minions to
kill Light Soldiers on sight. But while they fought, other beings
sought a refuge away from the war, a place to live peacefully away
from them, and found that place on the Periphery of life. Using the
lost chapters of Inanna's book, they created the Peripheral. Djins,
Succubi, Incubi, Fae, Faeries, all manner of creatures judged to be
inferior to Dark or the Light, sought this World out.

"Finding sanctuary there, Charybdis, Scylla,
and Chimera became their rulers, but instead of a refuge it became
a living hell. Soon the other Worlds found this Peripheral World
and discovered the leads of the horde were they. They attacked. It
was the first time the Dark and Light Worlds united under a common
cause. During the battle, a lone surviving child of the God Mother
spoke the spell of undoing."

"The what?" I asked.

"When Sophia kicked Inanna
out of their home, the book was ripped apart and scattered. Inanna
loved to write things down. And some things…" She looked at her
glass "…should
never
be written down. The God Mother, angry at the Light World for
killing her children, gave this child the power of destruction from
this book. This small child spoke the spell, and the Peripheral
burned. Everything inside of it was laid waste."

I swallowed. I'd seen this destruction. I'd
seen…the aftermath. "That…was part of the Bulwark."

"Yes. The fighting stopped. Immediately.
Those that survived picked up their toys and went home." She sipped
her drink. "The other worlds feared the magic that had come out of
the Peripheral, even though they never found the spell or the one
who recited it. So they threw everything they didn't like into the
Peripheral like so much garbage and sealed it away and never spoke
of it again."

"Holy shit," Darius said.

I leaned back in the chair. "But the spell
didn't kill everything in the Peripheral."

"No. It didn't kill the three things it
should have killed."

I held up my fingers and ticked them off.
"Scylla, Charybdis, and Chimera."

She nodded. "You should know the spell the
God Mother's child spoke might be in the book inside of you."

I put my hand to my chest. "That spell is in
here?"

"It could be. No one knows how complete the
book is. Only Inanna would know. But you see how powerful the
legend of the book is in the minds of those of us who lived through
such destruction."

So…the
Grimoire
could, in essence, destroy
the world. I'd always believed that was a myth, something the
Seraphim wanted to believe. But what if it were true? What if I had
inside me the magic capable of destroying everything?

"So now we have holes from the 'Pheral to
here and we have some of those nasties running around. Lovely." She
sat up. "I'll add this news to what I need to tell Mephistopheles.
He'll definitely want to send reinforcements to find her— "

"She's in Rhonda." I blurted it out. I
didn't know any other way to do it. I'd wanted to know who
Charybdis was first, and now that I did, I realized I had indeed
been the prisoner of a creature worse than Maab.

Raven stood and stared at me. "What?"

I licked my lips. "You thought it was a
Revenant…and you were right. Just not a Revenant like you. It was
Charybdis that somehow took Rhonda and brought her back to the
Peripheral." That's when I told them what happened to me there.
With the Djin possessed Lamia and then my experience with who I
thought was Stella. But I didn't tell them what I did to
Rhonda.

Raven was silent. "So she's found a
host."

"Yeah."

Darius finally said. "She's one of those
twins you were talking about."

I nodded.

"Pretty dangerous?"

I nodded again as I heard my phone ringing.
I put my hands to my back pockets but nothing was there. I hadn't
seen my phone in a while.

Raven stood and went to the table by the
door and retrieved it from a bowl with keys. She looked at the
face. "Girl in the boots?"

I held out my hand and took it. I hit
answer. "Sam?"

"What the fuck is wrong with Mike?"

Uh oh. "I uh—"

"You either get your tiny ass down here and
help me fix him, or I'm going to banish him back to the 'Pheral,
guns and all." She disconnected.

I looked at Darius and Raven. "I know where
Mike is. He's in New Orleans."

CORONER'S iD

We were packing the SUV when a familiar
white truck pulled up in front of the townhouse and blocked us
in.

Illy put the huge utility vehicle in park
and jumped out of the driver's seat, a folder in her hand.
"Dags!"

I smiled and wrapped my arms around her.
Before I knew it I was kissing her lips with a need I didn't
realize I had. She was warm and real and soft to touch.

When we came up for air, she brushed my
cheek with her fingers. "I'm so happy you're alive."

"Me too." I searched her face under the
street light and kissed her forehead. "Why're you here?" I wasn't
unhappy to see her. I was just surprised. While standing there, I
thought about asking her to go with us.

"Well, Darius left me a message that you
were back, but I was at work. And the reason I was at work late was
because the Coroner's Office was going to release the identity of
that last victim. The one they were holding back?"

Raven joined us, as did Darius.

She held the folder in both hands. "You're
not going to like it. I had them double check."

I took the folder and noticed she'd started
shaking. I glanced at Darius, then Raven as I opened the folder and
looked at the information given.

"What's everyone standing around for?"

As a unit we turned and looked at Stella.
She stood on the last step, her apron in place, her hands on her
hips.

"Death certificate." I handed the folder to
Raven and stepped forward. "For one Stella Ann Rosenberg. Age
thirty-four, weight one hundred and thirty pounds. Height,
five-seven. Hair, red. Town of residence, Roswell, Georgia." The
sword appeared white and silver in my hand as I wrapped my fingers
around the hilt. "Who, or what, the hell are you?"

about the author